Keep Your Eyes on the Legs

Gemini: Allow a little more levity into your daily life. Sometimes you could feel overwhelmed by all the requests being made of you. Schedule time for a loved one, whether it's a lengthy lunch or a special happening at the end of the day.

Believe me, I'm trying to look for levity in all the right places.

After two solid months of planning, two Geminis took on today's fierce wind by walking to Citizen for lunch (see above) and two hours of conversation.

What do you call something if you're trying to name it after me? The Bon Vivant, I'm told.

My day was made.

The new location boasts everything the old one didn't: soaring ceiling height, a rack of vintage comic books, colorful artwork, lots of light and a bar (not to mention dinner hours).

Lunch was two pupusas filled with black beans and cheese, topped with radishes, cilantro and pulled pork with a sassy tomatillo salsa for dipping. The accompanying curtido was less slaw-like and more pickled sliced vegetables, but the fruit salad - pineapple, apples, grapefruit, orange, kiwi - was appealingly fresh and juicy.

The entire afternoon was spent south of the river at the studio of a painter whose Dad once told me I was hot. Did I mention his Dad is my eye doctor? When I shared this information, he chuckled, insisting his father had every right since it was an "appropriate compliment."

With a clever wit and decided talent for mimicry, he entertained me to the point of laughter (see above) while surrounded by his paintings on the wall. Even when we got on to heavier subjects, an innate positivity suffused his take on life, something a fellow optimist appreciates.

Then there was the geek appeal. There is nothing quite as satisfying as spending hours with another art history nerd.

To illustrate what he was talking about, he'd pull out an art book or six and show me color plates of the paintings in question. Eventually, he brought out his laptop and we went down countless rabbit holes when we were reminded of this artist or that.

We went so far as to look at his high school yearbook so I could see him as a fresh-faced over-achiever participating in almost every activity.

It's no wonder when we looked up hours had passed and the sun was looking faint.

Scheduling time for me, I stopped at home long enough to find out how many people were making requests of me (see above) in the time I'd been gone (eight), changed clothes and went to dinner.

L'Opossum's bar had my favorite stool free and a man just finishing up his dinner - well, actually scraping every last bit of creme brulee out of the dish noisily with his spoon - so I slid in and was immediately greeted by the bartender who said he remembered serving me at Balliceaux.

Honestly, I marvel at how servers manage to remember a face out of so many.

As always, the lighting was gloriously dim (read: flattering) and the chef's play list was terrific. I'm talking French pop songs, Liberace, Burl Ives' "Keep Your Eyes on the Hands," a cover of Coldplay's "Viva la Vida" and my favorite Petula Clark song, "Don't Sleep in the Subway."

Noting my interest in the eclectic soundtrack, a photographer friend walked over, pointed at the speaker and said, "And that's Charro. I love this play list he made." Coochie, coochie (Google it, kids).

New to me on the menu was French onion dip gratinee with brandied figs served with Grandma Dave's toasted pecan-currant bread, which read like a list of things Karen loves. Accompanied by a glass of Jean-Luc Columbo Rose, I swooned over the sweet/salty combination and the flavorful vehicle to get it to my mouth.

Just as I finished eating, a guy asked if the seat next to me was taken (nope), ordered a martini (gin, so it counts as a martini) and provided me with a conversational partner.

I couldn't get too excited about his taste in music - jam bands, as in he's seen Phish scores of times - but his job fascinated me. First of all, he lives nowhere, as in no apartment, no house.

Because he works for the largest mobile power company in the world, he moves around and makes his home in different places depending on the job. Right now, that's in Richmond, but often his job involves happenings such as movie shoots and major sporting events. As in, he'll be in Rio this summer for the Olympics.

No home base, how interesting is that?

It suits his foodie nature fine because he gets to discover fabulous food cities through constantly moving around. Right now, he's in love with Richmond, especially how affordable it is to eat here, although he admitted a tendency to find something he likes and get in a rut with it.

He's been to Pizza Tonight four of the past seven days and had the same dish - pappardelle with duck ragout - every time.

Running into me seemed pre-ordained since he immediately asked for a list of places to eat so he can branch out, noting them in his phone and checking the spellings with me.

While I enjoyed venison carpaccio, he dug into Moroccan chicken, moaning over its complexity (and price) and feeling virtuous for a) having gone to the gym and b) breaking his pasta streak.

Despite our near stranger status, I neatly took care of that by sharing with him my lobster mac and cheese adrift in truffle mornay sauce and effectively sucking him right back down the pasta rabbit hole. Don't let him tell you he wasn't willing to be seduced.

Sated, our conversation drifted back to music. After procuring paper from the bartender and checking his phone, he wrote something down and slid it over to me like a secret password. The New Mastersounds, April 26, Broadberry.

"I expect you to be there," he said, certain that the British jazz fusion/funk band would appeal to me. "I hope you show up on a bar stool next to me at one of these other restaurants."

Are you trying to overwhelm me by making a request of me?

The final stop of the evening was at Stir Crazy Cafe to see Eastern European and Balkan folk band My Son, the Doctor play.

Not that I haven't seen them before, but now my friend is their bass player, a fact I only learned  last weekend when I randomly ran into him for the first time in three years. So long that both our relationship statuses had changed since I'd last seen him.

Holy cow, he'd gotten married. I had nothing to compare to that.

With dueling clarinets, guitar, bass, drums and percussion, the band wove a spell over the coffee shop that eventually caused two obviously talented women to get up and begin belly dancing in the center of the room (see above), despite not a single song being sung in English.

Sometimes special happenings at the end of the day don't require words you can understand. Most times they do.

Not at My Dive Bar You Don't

It was time for vacation debriefing.

Pru had also been away last week so we needed to meet up and compare notes. But first, it was l'Chaim time.

Because of scheduling conflicts, I'd yet to make it to any of the Anderson Gallery's happy hours, always one of my favorite summer series.

Nothing was going to prevent me tonight from seeing My Son the Doctor, a Klezmer/Balkan band I hadn't seen in years at the Anderson. And nothing did.

Their set was already in progress when I arrived, so I found a space and settled in for gypsy and Jewish songs of love and longing with lots of percussion.

During the break, I mingled with the baby-toting singer (her band would be wonderful on a bill with My Son), the Chicago sculptor ("Of course we're both here, it's free!") and the fiber artist (looking glamorous and offering a hug) before heading outside to chat with Te Frenchman who'd recently sold his house and joined the swells at Rockett's Landing.

Chatting outside in the garden, the post-rain air was so thick and humid, it had a life of its own.

When I departed there, dewy but happy after the energetic eastern European music, it was to meet Pru at the new Continental Divide and see what kind of Mexican comfort food this Charlottesville restaurant had to offer Richmond.

Their "Get in here" neon (with an arrow) had already made me a bit wary.

I should have known by how far away I had to park that the place would be mobbed. Inside, I found friends clustered around the bar and a nice, big tequila menu on the chalkboard at the end of the bar.

It was noisy, so noisy that I could only hear two songs and one was by CCCR, one of my least favorite bands, but I ordered Cazadores reposado and hoped for the best.

Pru introduced me to some of her friends after informing me that we would not be staying to eat because she'd found the menu underwhelming.

Me, I'd given the Divide points simply for their menu attitude. Lines such as, "Give everyone a break. If your baby is crying, take it outside," and "Come on, don't even ask for separate checks" called to mind other chefs who don't hesitate to lay down their house rules.

Once we started into catch-up mode, it quickly became apparent that the din was far too loud to allow any real conversation, so despite her friend's invitation to join their 12-top, we declined and beat feet.

It's not a dis. I'll go back to check out the red hot blues or maybe assess their nacho capabilities once the frenzy dies down.

Walking out of the madness, Pru asked where we were headed. After a moment's consideration, I told her we were headed for my neck of the woods. The Rogue Gentleman.

The rain had ceased not long before, but we still found a moat on Jackson Street and side-stepped it to make it inside.

Taking the end stools at the bar, I continued with tequila - Espolon this time- while Pru stayed true to France with Rose.

"I didn't eat lunch and I'm starving," she said, encouraging me as we looked at the menu.

With a cover of "Ain't No Sunshine When She's Gone" playing overhead (to our mutual great delight), we ordered pork belly rillette with pickled onion, wedges of radish (Pru is a certified radish fiend and I'm not far behind), sea salt and crostini; chicken liver pate with roasted beets, arugula and vin cotto; and, to mitigate the offal (and may I just say how much pleasure it gives me to see "offal" as a menu category), a salad of curly endive, peaches, baby heirloom tomatoes ('tis the season), turnip creme fraiche, and salmon roe.

As we dove into these three dishes, all beautifully balanced, I heard her vacation woes and shared my own (too many people, same as hers).

If I was forced to pick a favorite (because they were all stellar), I'd have to go with the pork belly rillette because how can you go wrong with pig belly cooked in fat? That's right, you can't.

And, as usual, Jackson Ward's street theater did not disappoint.

A white hearse drove by and a woman walking a dog waved at me.

Meanwhile, a bike rickshaw pulled up waiting for a couple and when they emerged, the driver quickly sat down on the seat, moving his butt across it to absorb any raindrops before letting them sit down.

A young couple came in, ordered two glasses of bubbly and inquired about the tasting menu before moving to a table so they could woo in private (he kept kissing her neck).

Pru wondered whether or not we needed dessert, but I suggested instead that we indulge in a digestif, namely the Fernet Branca the Rogue Gentleman has on tap. When in Rome and all.

Midway through our Fernet, three guys came in, all out-of-towners, and chose stools next to us.

Next came the arduous task of deciding what they wanted to drink from the creatively-conceived cocktail menu.

Two were rum drinkers and marveled at the kitchy glasses that their Sol y Sombra and Fu Manchu arrived in (worthy of the best tiki bars), while the third was a devotee of bourbon, choosing the 12 Parsecs, with the menu notation, "a parsec is a measure of distance not time."

I admit, I was curious about how three guys in town for a convention at the raceway had managed to find an obscure Jackson Ward bar, so I asked and they claimed it had been a cinch.

God bless the internet, I suppose.

What they'd decided they wanted on their next stop was some Pappy Van Winckle, and the bartender suggested McCormack's Whiskey Grill to scratch their itch, sending them to their phones to see if McCormack's carried it.

Forget a sense of adventure, forget going over there to find out for themselves, they had to call just in case.

As luck would have it, none of their phones provided the telephone number. Guess they were going to have to chance it.

"What dive bar should we go to that's good but a little dangerous?" the handsome Floridian inquired.

Whoa. Do I look like the kind of local who's going to spill those kind of beans to a conventioneer?

Come on, don't even ask for insider information. Give everyone a break.